Google Glass Porn and Other Reasons the Smart Glasses Keep Getting Creepier

Poor Google Glass. The revolutionary device hasn't even made it past its invite-only limited trial, and it's already being lampooned on Saturday Night Live, preemptively banned in public places, and questioned by members of Congress. But there are good reasons for the consternation and mockery, and the news that MiKandi and other pornography sites are looking to create porn and porn apps for Glass just adds one more reason to the pile. Here are some of those reasons why Google Glass is getting creepy already.

Glass Porn

One of the landmark principles of the Internet, put together by the adolescent geniuses of 4chan.org, is rule number 34: "If it exists, there is a porn of it." Apparently, we need an addendum that says "If it's connected to the Internet, you can get porn on it." For Google Glass, the inevitable is about to happen.

According to Zdnet, MiKandi, "the leading adult Android app creators and distributors" are working on a version of the pornography app for Google Glass, and may have something ready for the device within the week. If you don't like the sound of that, don't worry, it's all in the name of innovation, according to what MiKandi co-founder Jennifer McEwen said to Zdnet:

"We're experimenting with the features of Glass. From our initial use of the device, photo and video recording is more powerful than we expected. Obviously, Glass is perfect for shooting POV video, so we're experimenting with that first. But what's really interesting about Glass is that it's not just a hands free camera. It can receive and send data, so there are a lot of interesting interactions that we want to explore."

Interesting interactions, indeed. Porn companies like MiKandi are particularly excited in the idea of Glass providing an intuitive point-of-view experience for their customers -- like the porn version of all of those skydiving and rollercoaster videos -- while, according to the International Business Times, Glass makes the porn more difficult to pirate.

Cinematographic and copyright innovations aside, this is the newest reason why Glass is constantly getting creepier. What image do you call to mind when you think of a Glass Explorer, that is, someone wearing Google Glass? Is it a man walking down the street with the geeky spectacles on his face, is it someone sitting on the subway, or is it a business executive at a board meeting? In any case, it's probably someone out in public, which makes perfect sense, since Glass was built to blend into your everyday activity and make communication, information, and navigation easier -- on the go.

Now combine that out-and-about image of a Google Glass wearer with the knowledge that there are porn apps for it, and add in the fact that no one but the wearer can know what's on the screen. Creepy.

Facial Recognition

Aside from the porn factor -- and CNN Money notes that only about 1% of mobile traffic currently is pornography (let's hope it stays there, Glass Explorers) -- there are other reasons to be disturbed by the approaching world of Google Glass, and they all stem from the privacy concerns, not of Glass wearers, but of everyone else. One such reason is facial recognition.

According to TechCrunch, San Francisco startup Lambda Labs is preparing to release a facial recognition toolkit to build apps such as "find your friends in a crowd" and "remember this face." This API (application programming interface) is also slated to come out sometime this week.

While Glass director of product management Steve Lee has said, "we won't add new face recognition features unless we have strong privacy protections in place," Lambda Labs' co-founder Stephen Balaban contends, "There is nothing in the Glass Terms of Service that explicitly prevents us from doing this. However," he added, "there is a risk that Google may change the ToS in an attempt to stop us from providing this functionality."

So Google may prevent Glass users from having the ability to remember your face and instantly recognize you anywhere, but how much you want to rely on Google to protect your privacy is up to you? Oh, and if you think hiding your face will nullify Glass's ability to find you in a crowd, there's an app for that. InSight -- a company partly funded by Google -- is working on clothing recognition to identify you based on your fashion sense, even with your back turned.

Nonstop Photography

Perhaps the primary reason why people are concerned about Glass is its unique capacity to take video and pictures at any time, without the subjects of its photography being aware. While smartphone technology has already enabled a controversial/possibly illegal, and now banned deformity of Reddit called "creepshots" -- privacy-intruding public photography that's as creepy as it gets -- Glass's ever-present camera has sparked concerns that it will enable more of the same.

Some public establishments have already banned Glass. According to Cnet, the 5 Point, a dive bar in Seattle, was the first to ban the device (which also, coincidentally of course, made for great publicity for the bar). In an interview on Seattle radio, the bar's owner, Dave Meinert, said, "Part of this is a joke... [to] get reaction. But part of it's serious, because we don't let people film other people or take photos unwanted of people in the bar, because it is kind of a private place that people go [sic]."

Perhaps we're all overreacting though. As this parody video on Google Glass photography demonstrates, maybe it will be quite obvious when Glass Explorers are taking pictures or video. If you don't want to be recorded on camera, just look for the guy with the huge thing on his face, weirdly lurching around while trying to keep his head level.

Perhaps Glass's awkward factor will completely cancel out its creepiness.